I mean I would definitely call this more of a natural decline. There is definitely something to be said for the move to YouTube allowing for a great amount of post match discussion to be done in the comments section instead of on a 3rd party sight like over.gg. The real big killer I think was looking part of the main draw to over.gg, the journalism which to be fair is because a lot of the writers either moved to vlr.gg or to over sights entirely (a fair few OWL which is pretty cool). But because of this most news was pretty late and the articles were pretty short meaning by the time the hype was gone and discussion ended. I remember a tiny push a bit back where a few over.gg diehards started writing some articles which was fun for a bit

Damn Chengdu, big sad on the stage playoffs. But also this does indeed validate that leave is the most valuable player for the season. And for all the LIP fans, mvp aint just the cracked out kid on the best team, its the player who is most valuable to the team. On Shanghai LIP is just another one of there top quality players who had a slighly better season than his peers on the dragons, where as leave it a shining star going above and beyond the impact of his teammates making him move valuable to Hunters than LIP is to the Dragons. And since pretty much every other candidate is out we're just back to the age of mvp race of guy who stands out on the best team vs the guy who is hardcore carrying a good team to be places they shouldn't be (JJonak vs Carpe, Season 2 there wasn't really a contest, Fleta vs Carpe and to an extent Xzi).

NOOOO THE BREAD BOWL

So like let's get a thread going on which absolute mad lad from the free agent or reasonable trade (no profit/lip kinda trades) is gonna have to try fill the size 40 shoes striker just left at the shock

My best two candidates are the recently released godsb, kid had a lot of potential and still does seeing him come alive again on the shock would be epic and innovation who I would say is really the best tracer hitscan talent in contenders right now

Nah, looks fine to me up gaming move to China confirmed

When blizzard decide to send every off tanks career the way of youngjins. Feelsbadman

That's a pretty colossal ooft if I've ever seen one

I had faith in my boys....

They didn't think it could be done... but ChengDO what others don't!

Yo, why aint they opening with this match instead of Dallas Houston. Assuming all goes well this should be an absolute banger

God I hope it's not quite time to pull out the :candle: yet. This man is truely a legend :'(

I love how people have just started writing the articles that aint there. Surely we keep this up

indeed

Disclaimer, I don't claim to write very well or for over.gg for that matter. Just got bored and thought since there was nothing out from over.gg on the LA news i'd give it a try myself, also don't judge my poor grammar to hard :)

The Los Angles Valiant have announced their new Chinese roster following the organizations structural rebuild to partner LinGan E-Sports, former academy partners of the Chengdu hunters, who will be handling operations for Company’s overwatch league team withing the 2021 season.

The team announced on weibo that the 2021 LA Valiant Roster would consist of former overwatch league players Krystal’s and Wya who both most recently played with the Guangzhou Charge and a cast of Chinese Rookies, mostly fielded from former The One Winner contenders players.

Insert cool picture here of probably Krystal since his like the big name draw for this roster. Also surely reply with the word pineapple if your still reading the low quality news post :)

Krystal any Wya joins the Valiant having most recently played for the Charge’s academy team ‘Ultra Prime Academy’ as two-way players with the Charge. Regularly fighting against relegation before a re-structure in the 4th week of Season 2 Contenders China which left them free agents going into the 2021 off season. It should also be noted that Krystal played with the Hangzhou Spark in 2019 before leaving with controversy and legal action being taken again the player by the team.

The new Chinese Contenders rookies within the roster are DPS player MoLanran, Main Tank Silver3 and Support Highbee who most recently played for The One Winner, ShowCheng who recently played Off Tank for Flag Gaming and Main Tank player NvM who recently returns from a 2 year long retirement in December 2018.

2 big concerns of this roster are going to be NvM’s return to competitive play following his 2-year long hiatus from game having last played for LGE in contenders China Season 3 under the name ‘Aidoudou’. The other being the transition of highbee from is previous role as T1W’s off tank to the flex support position of the LA Valiant.

This season’s LA Valiant staff will consist of Coach’s JpCat formerly of T1W and Hiko formerly of Flag Gaming who have the task to prepare and mold their rookie team before the roster’s debut game against the Chengdu Hunters 17/04/2021 in week 1 of the 2021 Overwatch League season.

The Los Angles Valiant’s Roster is:

• Cai "Krystal" Shilong (DPS)
• Liao “MoLanran” Yang (DPS)
• Han “Siver3” Haibo (Tank)
• Wem “NvM” Yelin (Tank)
• Cheng “ShowCheng” Yu (Tank)
• Zhang “Highbee” Zening (Support)
• Qi “Way” Haomiao (Support)

Well that was fun :)

Well as 1 on the 3 survivors I guess it would be good to add some of my own thoughts to this thread.

1. Even as a diehard fan of fusion I can't justify placing then above a Shanghai roster who have only really functionally changed main tanks swapped ding for Erster and luffy for Molly. Especially given the easily argued down grade with both starting tank players.

2. I think it's kind of optimistic to believe at neither Houston or Boston aren't likely to expload or fail to click. As such that massive risk means I could not justify them taking a place over the rock solid splitfire. Especially given the recent steel series event where splitfire played a solidly close set against the glads while Boston got clean swept.

3. Man I fucking love actually seeing some discussion on this site. Granted I do think a lot of the drop off right now is definitely related to the longer than usual off season meaning less games and the lack of articles relating to the game and news which I'd assume is a result of a number of the writers producing content for vlr.gg instead

I mean to an extent. Of course the off season drought doesn't help but that's kinda just how OW esports is. But from a site level, it makes a lot more sense to develop the Val.gg site primarily as it's experiencing massive growth as the game starts to devolope (similarly to what happened with over.gg when OW started to boom). Also with overwatch 2 coming I wouldn't call in meza with the :candle: yet

not quite as the good as season 1 Sanfran's triple Andre team

And this day, the streak was ended

The spitfire all western was confirmed in the video detailing nouky as the new GM

I'm very interested to see what cans for the rest of this team with rapel, Doha and the Dallas Eternal

I could definitely see him being part of the new EU talent Spitfire rebuild. Other than that possibly a move to Outlaws or Defiant (depending on the direction defiant take)

I mean probably not, I'd say they might be waiting until proper off season. Aswell they are likely looking to sell of some players to teams that don't seem to pull all the promise out of new players. I could see myongbong defs getting shipped off.

I mean understandable. Mans had a hell of the job this year, even working in the back end predominately. I could understand wanting to step back from it all and into a different role.

I mean definitely a fair bit but also their is definitely a lot teams that break the mold on that so it clearly isn't the only option,

For example,
Houston: who have been rather mediocre since stage one season one but carried a huge amount of publicity off there team personalities and their content)

Shanghai: legit became one of the most popular teams by sucking at the video game in season one

Atlanta: middle of the pack team with strong personalities and content holding a large following (yes they came for defran but stayed for the brand)

I think I really comes back to the old "is marketable" meme from pre-season one.

And a lot of that marketability comes from the angle that the team takes in marketing. Nyxl and Justice do provide very good opposites in showing that though, the Nyxl marketing works so well because they marketed around 2 things, there city and there player personalities. Two things with really worked well for them due to strong NY pride (especially in a generally good team) and the amount their players put personalities forward. Where as Justices marketing appeals to American patriotism more than it does locally, as such a bunch of Korean players and a Swede being pushed as the American team, while that just aint marketable without the results to push past it.

Tldr, marketing has to match the roster and branding together to be successful which is really what matters

Just one thing Snivy, double check your months in the opening sentence, then the article is golden

Hey I'm just saying Atlanta do kind of have an opening for someone who covers that babybay hero pool and ta1yo does fit the bill

The Glads had to make room for big boy sideshow to come in and party

Big call washington to win by default with titans not presenting enough possible players to compete

for people who want to double check that, they were the support line for the Russian team Tornado Rox

Heres a fun one for the history books, mistakes actually has a history on support. Playing the role professionally prior to his time as the premier Tracer player for 123, where he played alongside main tank tonic who was also a support player prior to 123.

The more you know :)

It's always sad to see the old names leave, but it make sense to follow on with his law degree and such. Reminds me a bit of TwoEasy. Realistically it's kind of the reality behind esports, as far a it being a carear goes there is kind of 3 options retire into coaching, pursue another industry or move into personality work (streaming, casting, analysis work, ect). However as the guy who sat next to gumba once said, "I've spent all my years in tech wishing that I gave professional skiing" (paraphrasing a really obscure reference) always worth giving the dream a go, even if it probably won't work

Well we already know leave is confirmed for a contract next year so that would make sense for covering YangXiaoLong however it will be interesting to see if they bring in another main tank or not

Most likely stay in working with team itself when they travel as a lot of the reason Paris managed to sign sparkle was that he wanted to continue working with head coach Rush, so I'd say it is reasonable to believe that sparkle would want to work with the team itself and travel with them which would hardly be conducive to playing for an academy team given the constant change of ping, availability and time differences that would make organizing it a nightmare for a GM

I find it rather unlikely they would play him in a 2 way position for the start of the season

Philly pulled players out of unknown places before, eternal were rather known for scouring europe for talent. So I guess probably those guys

With so many players hitting free agency so many teams are opting to re-structure and grab for talent

Is the kirby fusion split worth adding to the tracker, since though he left the organisation he was in more of a management role as apossed direct coaching.

I'm assuming Australia opted out probably having already secured funding to make it to blizz con.

Someone missed the memo on the best of 7 series, that or his predicting the big brain draw

I still don't understand how the soft regionlocking works here.

Envy out here collecting EU tank lines like they're pokemon

Me looking at goats then bunker

Pain is dead, long live the pain

:(

(Just gonna copy paste a post I made on a recent match)
Honestly the fusion loan system is geneous from philly. Not only do they get hold onto right of 1st refusal for academy players, they also get the playerswage covered ( at least in part) by the loan. Meaning it's cheep talent, that's still active in the scene both preventing rust and increasing market value. So if they want to pull them back to the main team fu or owl/ sell them to other other owl teams.

Like its actually 2 strong, they don't even take up the contenders roster spots

Honestly the fusion loan system is geneous from philly. Not only do they get hold onto right of 1st refusal for academy players, they also get the playerswage covered ( at least in part) by the loan. Meaning it's cheep talent, that's still active in the scene both preventing rust and increasing market value. So if they want to pull them back to the main team fu or owl/ sell them to other other owl teams.

Like its actually 2 strong, they don't even take up the contenders roster spots

Why stop at getting one of them,
Bring on the team UK philly we all dream
for. Hayes make this shit happen

Damn, didn't see that one coming

Yeah they get away with it because punk has duel citizenship with the US. Otherwise they would need another starting na player

Lowkey, is there anything stopping them from selling players to them self (e.g. trading Muma to the valiant for literally nothing).

Feelsbadman